A: Success at the Olympic Games here in Athens is obviously tied up into three things. From the corporate end, it is profit. We already know we are profitable. It is just how much. Two, is what kind of impression it has on the audience in terms of ratings? Particularly the primetime telecasts over 17 nights. And, lastly, a sort of sense that it moved people. That is sometimes a little bit hard to define.

Q: How would you do it?

A: It is everything from a sense that young people from the United States got caught up in the Games. I’ve been able to see that. I knew in 1996 a lot of young women and girls really got caught up in gymnastics. The proof is that here we are eight years later and we are here with all these fantastic 15-, 16-, 17-year-old girls who are the start of the best gymnastics team in the world, the U.S. women.

Q: What will be different about your coverage for these Olympics compared to the 2000 Games?

A: This is the first time in history that all 28 sports are seriously close to being completely covered. I don’t know if it will ever happen again. We have been told for years that the public would like to see everything. Now that NBC, over these past four years, has added so many cable platforms, we are able to put the Olympics on seven different channels or platforms, which allows us to do the 1,200 hours. That is the game-changer for the audience.

Q: If you still had the NBA, would more of the Dream Team games be on NBC instead of USA Network?

A: No, because as much as we possibly can we want all of the typical American team sports to be seen live. All of the U.S. women’s soccer games, basketball games (both men and women), the water polo matches, we are trying to show as many of those events live. The way we have it now is the weekend games are on the network and during

the week they are on cable.

Q: How much will you focus on the steroid issue surrounding these Games?

A: I think before the track and field starts, not that much, because the majority of all the sports don’t have serious drug issues. Track and field does, and that starts midway through the Games on Friday, Aug. 20. You can be sure, in setting the stage for the entire track competition, that will be covered.